


Snowstorm

by KUG



Category: Wild Kratts
Genre: Accidental Cuddling, Cuddling & Snuggling, F/M, I'm Not Ashamed, Mutual Pining, One Shot, Self-Indulgent, Sharing Body Heat, Sharing a Bed, only one bed trope
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-11
Updated: 2018-12-11
Packaged: 2019-09-16 03:06:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16945809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KUG/pseuds/KUG
Summary: Getting caught out in a snowstorm is bad news, so finding the cabin was a piece of luck. But with just one tiny stove and the threat of hypothermia looming overhead, they're going to have to share the bed. Worse, they're going to have to share the sleeping bag.It's a good thing that neither of them have feelings for each other. Right?





	Snowstorm

**Author's Note:**

> Every time I write more Chroki I say I am unstoppable, and it's true. I'm the captain of this ship so I sail it wherever I please, even into "very overused but still good trope" waters.  
> [Originally written February 24th, 2018]

There was only one bed. But it was pitch black and storming like crazy outside, and they were both soaked to the skin and shivering. They were lucky to have found the old hunting cabin at all, let alone with a bed.

Shaking with cold and fatigue, Chris managed to light a fire in the tiny potbellied stove using matches and a pile of kindling that was already inside. He made sure to open the flue, then found a stack of firewood in a box in the corner.

“We really hit the jackpot,” he said, grinning in spite of chattering teeth.

Koki couldn’t bring herself to respond to that. “We have to get warmed up, fast,” she said.

She wasn’t sure if Chris’s face was red with cold or embarrassment. “We should get out of our wet clothes first,” he mumbled, picking up the lone chair in the cabin and sitting it in front of the stove. “Let’s hang out our warmest layers first, that’s most important. I won’t look, I promise.”

He kept his promise. Koki’s teeth chattered as she stripped to her underwear.

Chris was too busy dragging the waterproof sleeping bag from his backpack and scouring the cabinet for blankets. He found two, and shook a bit of dust from the top one before laying out the sleeping bag. Koki almost snatched a blanket from him and wrapped it around herself as she huddled next to the stove, shivering violently and trying to rub the dampness off her skin. She glanced over, once, and saw Chris peeling off his white undershirt. His back was to her and even as cold and tired and miserable as she was, her eyes absorbed the sight of his back muscles rippling under smooth tan skin.

 _Oh no. Nope_. Now was not the time for this. She looked away quickly.

In no time Chris was wrapped up in the other blanket and sitting next to Koki, stoking the fire in the stove into a cheerful blaze. Their fingers started to get some feeling back but they were still shivering.

“What now?” Koki asked.

“We wait out the storm.”

“Yeah, but what’s next _right now_?”

“Oh.” He was too quiet, feeding another log into the fire. “Logically and practically, it would make a lot of sense for us to get in the sleeping bag together to warm up.”

“Okay,” she replied, “Let me wait for my clothes to dry.”

He coughed. “Naked….”

“No way,” she said immediately, trying not to blush.

“Not totally!” Chris defended quickly, and violently shoved a log into the stove. “We could wear our underwear and maybe a spare shirt or something. But skin on skin contact is better to warm up.”

“If I didn’t know you any better, I’d think you were joking.”

“Well I’m not. I’ve done it before, when Martin fell into a stream when we were out on a winter retreat with a few friends. Everyone else in the group was out at the time and the heating was terrible in the first place and I had to make sure he didn’t get hypothermia. Which _we_ could still get if we’re not fast.”

Koki accepted her fate. “Okay, fine.”

They got up and both pounced on the sleeping bag, the cold making them eager to get covered again as they draped their blankets over the bag.

It a was narrow bed, almost more like a cot, and once they’d both managed to shimmy down into the down sleeping bag, face to face, it was a very tight fit. Their faces were mere inches from one another.

“No funny business,” Koki reiterated, teeth still chattering.

“Yes ma’am,” Chris said, pulling on the drawstring so that only the tiniest opening allowed air into their cocoon. Then they both rolled over to lie back to back, shivering.

After a time, Koki no longer felt numb all over, and she felt stronger, no longer snow-sleepy, but just tired from hours of hiking through snow. Except now that she could feel all her limbs, she was more aware than ever of the places that her body was pressed against Chris’s. Their legs were tangled together and every time Chris breathed his back pressed against hers, reminding her of the sheer amount of skin to skin contact they had.

Despite that, somehow she drifted off, starting to _finally_ feel warm.

Sometime in the next few hours Koki woke to find that the fire in the stove had died to embers, the glow barely illuminating the tiny cabin. Groggily, she made as if to get out of the sleeping bag to go stoke the fire. Immediately arms constricted around her waist and a sleepy grumble made her stop. She rolled slightly, confused. As awareness filtered in she finally realized what was going on.

In their sleep she and Chris had started spooning, probably unconsciously seeking more warmth. Now his sleeping face was pressed against the back of her neck; his eyes must be twitching in his sleep because his eyelashes tickled her skin. Koki thought she must be blushing from head to toe, but she also found herself wanting to snuggle into the contact even more. Every breath he took pressed his chest against her back, and the pressure of it was oddly comforting.

But she had to get out and put more wood on the fire. They couldn’t last without a fire going, even if they were snuggled together in the sleeping bag. She wiggled out of Chris’s grip enough to stick her head out of the bag, hearing him mumble in protest as she moved away from him.

Koki realized that from here she could reach both the pile of logs and the stove. Pleased with the realization that she didn’t have to get all the way out, Koki managed to snake out an arm and grab a small log from the top. She had to lean off the cot to reach the stove enough to shove it in, but the log clattered satisfyingly into the embers and a tongue of flame sputtered to life on the dry wood.

“Mm, Koki?” Chris stirred, his arms loosening from their hold around Koki’s stomach.

“I’m putting wood on the fire,” she whispered above the wind that still roared outside. “Just go back to sleep.”

She felt his forehead press back against her, on her shoulder now. She managed to put two more sizable logs on the fire before her arm started feeling too cold again. The fire looked okay now anyway, so Koki slipped back all the way inside the sleeping bag.

As she got snuggled back down, she felt Chris’s arms tightening around her again and he nuzzled his face into the back of her neck. _He’s definitely asleep, he’s asleep, he won’t remember this_ , Koki thought to herself, struggling not to get flustered. But his body pressed flush against hers was comforting and wonderfully warm, so she couldn’t bring herself to pull away and get in a less…compromising… position.

Slowly she drifted off into sleep again, warm and secure in Chris’s sleeping embrace.

A shout woke them in the morning.

“Koki! Chris!”

They jolted awake, groggy and confused, and Koki was the first to worm her head out of the sleeping bag, blinking in the brilliant sunlight that shone in through the open cabin door. Freezing air washed over her neck and shoulders and she shivered, wanting nothing more than to slip back inside and curl up in the curve of Chris’s warm body again.

Then she registered those who had yelled as they stomped across the cabin, ecstatic with relief. Aviva and Martin, bright-eyed and bundled up against the cold, hurried to the cot, exclaiming loudly.

“Thank goodness you’re okay!” Aviva gasped.

“Where’s Chris?” asked Martin.

“Huh?” Chris emerged from the sleeping bag, blinking sleepily and letting his chin rest against Koki’s shoulder as he had done almost all night.

Koki was awake enough by now to notice how quickly Aviva and Martin’s eyes widened and their jaws dropped. She was also waking up to the point where she realized how bad this must look; her and Chris, probably looking naked from this angle, in a sleeping bag together.

“We’re not naked,” she blurted out, oh-so-eloquently. _Nice going Koki._

Martin and Aviva exchanged a shocked look, and then suddenly Martin’s whole face scrunched up. He fought it for a second, then gave up and exploded into laughter.

Chris was starting to wake up for real now, and he shifted abruptly away from Koki—he had some trouble trying to untangle his legs from hers. She was sure that if she turned around she’d see that his whole face was beet red.

“How did you find us?” Chris asked, trying to distract the others.

“After the storm passed, we were able to locate the GPS in Koki’s Creature Pod, which was still on and active,” Aviva explained.

“Active?” Koki frowned. She didn’t remember what she’d last done with it.

“Never mind that,” Martin said, having recovered from his laughing fit. “Aviva and I are going to step outside so you two can get dressed.” He looped his arm through Aviva’s and they turned smartly around and marched out of the cabin, shutting the door behind them. Muffled chatter and giggles erupted from the outside the moment the latch clicked home.

Koki felt very tired and defeated all of a sudden, and she flopped back down on the cot with a heaving sigh. “Why did they have to ruin it,” she mumbled, “I was so warm and cozy.”

Chris made a strangled little noise halfway between a laugh and a cough and Koki rolled slightly to see his brown eyes gleaming with amusement and embarrassment. “Me too,” he said.

Rolling over again, Koki hid her blush. “Why don’t you get up first and get dressed so I can dress in private?”

He snorted good-naturedly but got out of the sleeping bag. “Oh sure, so _you_ can ogle me?”

“As if,” she shot back, “I’m gonna keep my eyes closed so I don’t have to look at your skinny white butt.”

“Wow, okay, I have a _great_ butt, thank you very much.”

“You _wish_ you did,” she shot back, covering her eyes in an exaggerated gesture.

He only gave a _hmph_ in response to that, and Koki heard clothes rustling as he got dressed. He finished quickly, as she heard his footsteps heading to the door. “Okay, I’m stepping out. Hurry up, I want to get to the Tortuga and a hot breakfast ASAP.”

She could tell he was just teasing, so she shot back, “No I’m gonna take all day and do my hair and makeup too.”

“Ugh,” he mock huffed, opening the door and stepping out. Before it closed, Koki could already hear him raising his voice in a protest as Martin and Aviva metaphorically pounced on him.

Grinning, Koki got out of the sleeping bag at last, shivering as she was fully exposed to the cold air; the fire had died a long time ago. She started getting dressed quickly, muttering about the cold and the fact that some parts of her pants were still damp. As she reached for her parka, something fell and clattered on the floor. She leaned over to look and saw her Creature Pod. Picking it up, she realized why Aviva had said it was still active: it was filming.

Koki blinked at it in surprise. It must have been going all night, because the last time she’d touched it was during the storm. She must have hit the record button on accident. It was a wonder that the battery wasn’t completely dead. She stopped the recording and then looked back over the video. Yep, it started in the snowstorm, and darkness and wind noises were the only thing it had captured for a while.

She skipped forwards a bit more and suddenly her eyes widened. When she’d gotten undressed, the way she’d set it down had somehow been at a perfect angle to record the area right in front of the stove and cot.

It’d accidentally caught a perfect shot of Chris getting undressed.

Yeah…Koki was definitely lying when she said that Chris didn’t have a great butt.

Cheeks burning with a blush, she closed down the application and turned off her Creature Pod to conserve what little battery power remained. She put on her parka and slipped the device in her pocket before heading out to join the others.

She thought she’d better keep the accidental recording a secret until she could delete it for good or else she’d never hear the end of it….


End file.
